Governments increasing spend on Customer Relationship Management solutions
Driven by the need to improve its management of constituent relationships, a new report from Datamonitor predicts that government spending on customer relationship management (CRM) technology solutions in the US, UK, Germany and France will grow from $2.9 billion in 2008 to $4.4 billion in 2013. In today's commercially-oriented world, it has become a trend among public sector agencies to treat constituents as customers who expect top levels of service.
By adopting a CRM strategy, government agencies can achieve a host of benefits when it comes to streamlining its business processes and analytical capabilities. With the increased emphasis on performance management in government agencies, CRM steps up to the plate by allowing government to track the nature of constituents inquiries --'who', 'what', 'why', 'where', 'when', and even 'how'; CRM solutions increasingly support multi-channel communications, including phone, email and in some cases, even text messages. Despite the many obvious benefits to adopting CRM, implementation faces inevitable challenges which must be addressed in order for government to realize the full value of these solutions. The report notes that a key aspect of CRM as a solution is only as good as the agency that implements it. A successful CRM implementation involves buy-in from management and staff, as well as the adoption of constituent-centric business process, with the technology serving as the grand enabler in the equation.
Lifetime Customer Value Identified as a Key Motivator for Customer Loyalty in Retail
Aberdeen recently surveyed 231 retail enterprises to determine the current state of loyalty technology and process integration in retail. Aberdeen data reveals that the top business pressure impacting loyalty-related decisions of 58% of Best-in-Class companies in retail is the need to develop lifetime customer value, which is defined as the present value of future cash flows through long-term customer relationships.
Aberdeen data reveals that 93% of retailers execute loyalty programs as a standard offering for their web, store, or catalog channel customers. Such campaigns include, but are not limited to, point perks, rewards, coalition marketing, frequent buyer offers, or private label credit cards. The measurement of ROI on customer loyalty programs is a continuous action at retail headquarters. Moreover, determining such an ROI is a much simpler process compared to other retail solutions such as POS, merchandising or pricing. There are substantial and recurring cost factors associated with loyalty in retail. Survey results show that cost-benefit issues surrounding loyalty scenarios are top-of-mind for retail marketers. Repeat visit (61%), incremental sales (58%), and overall satisfaction (57%) have emerged as the three most significant factors used by retailers for justifying spend on loyalty elements, operational costs, and upgrade / deployment of loyalty software applications. All three ROI criteria can lead to sales uplift, retention improvement, and reduced attrition for retailers.
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